#CurrysIntrojuicing Overview: An Evening of Nutrition Smoothie Making and Body Conditioning Circuits

On Tuesday just gone, I was one of many awesome bloggers, writers, journo’s and pr’s fortunate to be invited along to #currysintrodjuicing  Organised by the awesome team at Greenlight Digital (Joe Blogs Network) and hosted by @curryspcworld I knew this night was going to be a success in the days leading up to the event.

Why was I sooo confident on about this? Well, aside from the obvious fact that the evening involved a talk on nutrition, juicing, smoothie making AND a gruelling body conditioning class at Urban King’s Gym, what made this evening extra special for me was the people I would be surrounded with that night.

To learn that an awful lot of awesome bloggers I follow on Twitter, some I know and had met before and others I had yet to meet but converse on Twitter regularly with were all going to be under one roof was awesome and to top it off, my lovely #hollandandbarrett buddy Emma was also invited and couldn’t contain my excitement at finally meeting her!

#CurrysIntrojuicing

I arranged to meet Emma and Bei and Kings Cross Station for 6.30 pm but with typical train and tube delays we didn’t arrive at the station until 6.45 pm (the time we were supposed to arrive at the event!) and after a few minutes of general chatter catching up we made the short walk to the Greenlight Digital offices.

Upon arriving, I was amazed at the turn out, the room was packed full of over 45 talented bloggers across different industries, not just health and fitness as first thought, but from travel, beauty and lifestyle too! Approximately 10 mins passed by before the evening commenced.

Nutritional Talk With Derry Temple

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A quick introduction from the organisers Greenlight Digital and our hosts Currys PC World, we were then handed over to Derry Temple, a qualified Nutritionist, fitness PT at Urban Kings Gym for our talk on Nutrition.

Derry began his talk by covering the topic on juicing, how we can incorporate a juice a day into our regime and to ensure more vegetables than fruit are incorporated into our home-made juice concoctions to avoid consuming high levels of fructose. For those not aware, fructose is the natural sugars found in  fruits but eating too much of this can cause a spike in blood sugar levels!

I’m a green juice kinda girl who loves incorporating superfood powders into my juices such Wheat grass, Spirulina and Chlorella to name a few so naturally opt for juices or smoothies made with more veg and micro-nutrients.

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Derry also discussed his thoughts on juice fasts and why he thinks having only juice for the duration of the fast is not good for the body. Having completed a few one day juice cleanses in the past, I too am of the opinion that we should  incorporate some type of meal whenever completing a juice cleanse for after all our body needs protein, carbohydrates and fats to keep our internal system ticking over nicely.

After nodding profusely like the dog in the church hill advert throughout the duration of the nutritional talk, we were let loose on having a play with the various Philips juicers dotted around the room in an attempt to make our own healthy concoctions using the advice and tips Derry just gave us.

Smoothie Making

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Nothing fills me with joy more than seeing a wonderful rainbow of fruits and veggies on display. Eyeing up the ingredients, my mind was set on making a green goddess smoothie. I decided on choosing the following ingredients:

  • 2 slices of pineapple
  • a generous handful of spinach
  • a pinch of parsley
  • two cabbage leaves
  • 1 golden delicious apple
  • a block of ginger
  • 2 celery sticks
  • 250ml koko coconut milk
  • 15 g of unflavoured protein powder for good measure.

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Equip with my ingredients I took time to thoroughly wash them find a juicing station that was not already in use. Once I figured how to operate the device in went my ingredients, one by one and was initially amazed how powerful the juicer actually was. It broke down the entire whole apple in seconds.

I did have an embarrassing moment though… Without thinking I thought it was a good idea to pour the coconut milk directly into the funnel where the whole fruits and veggies go rather than add it to my juice at the end and much to the amusement of my friend Bei, simply couldn’t stop laughing uncontrollably at my decision for a good 30 seconds lol!

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Taste taste complete (my was this concoction AMAZING) I somehow stopped myself from downing the lot and set my bottle aside in the fridge to chill for a bit.

Urban Kings Body Conditioning Class 

Due to the sheer size of the group in attendance, two 30 min classes were to take place. Myself, Bei and Emma were in the second class which gave us 30 mins to catch up further with each other whilst introjuicing ourselves to other bloggers in the room. We met some super cool bloggers in that time and before you know it was our turn to be put through our paces.

As we made our way down to Urban Kings Gym the first group emerged dripping in sweat and glowing from the workout they had just completed. I knew then this was not going to be easy so prepared for a gruelling 30 mins.

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Upon entering the Urban King’s Gym, I smiled with excitement learning this was a martial arts gym! Given my own martial background I took a few seconds to admire the display of branded uniform and boxing gloves as we made our way downstairs to our designated area.

I can tell you now my nostrils did not take too kindly at being immediately greeted with the most unpleasant lingering odour of sweat and perspiration (yuk!)

Shoes off we descended on the soft mats for our group picture before getting down to business!

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The warm-up consisted of typical martial arts and boxing techniques to raise ones heart rate such as side steps turning in and out, high knees, heals to bum, floor sweeps etc. Warm up complete, we were spilt into two teams.. team A and team B. I was in team A and was appointed as the person to go first!

The 30 min body conditioning session had 10 workout stations were we had to perform the following exercises:

  1. 10 Alternating Lunges
  2. 10 Burpees
  3. 10 Squat Press using desired Kettle bell weights
  4. 10 Step ups on a plyometric box
  5. 10 Modified press-ups (on knees)
  6. 10 Squats using sand bags
  7. 10 Full Press Ups (on toes)
  8. 10 Goblet Squats using desired Kettle bell weight
  9. 10 Hop overs using a bench
  10. Fast feet over an agility ladder x 5 before tagging the next person to go.

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We performed the above THREE TIMES before cool downing to conclude our session and by the end of it all I was sweating in places I never knew existed (hides face) and shared a giggle over this with Bei who unsurprisingly shared the same thoughts *bellows with laugher as I type this*

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Dripping in sweat (credit to Bei’s camera skills) we headed back to the Greenlight Offices to devour our pre made chilled smoothies which, I must point out did the job at keeping the dreaded DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness) at bay!

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 I had a total blast catching up with old faces and new, meeting my #hollandandbarrettbuddy Emma for the first time and if I’m honest, is probably one of the best health and fitness events I have had the pleasure of attending period!

A huge thank you to the wonderful team at Greenlight Digital for inviting everyone along, our amazing hosts Curry’s PC World and to Derry to the gruelling body conditioning workout at Urban Kings Gym!

If the evening wasn’t awesome enough, I was extremely grateful and shocked to learn that everyone in attendance that night will be sent a Philips juicer to experiment with at home. We all are truly grateful for this kind gesture by our hosts.

Currys PC World’s encounter of the fabulous #currysintrojuicing evening can also be read by clicking here